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The business market that sells products to people who want them. What's with the rhetorical questions?

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I like to take your ideas and supersize them. This isn't criticism, it is flattery. I come with nothing but good will and a spirit of team-building. If you take what I write any other way, that is probably just because I wasn't very clear.

I seem to remember getting a jet pack that was good for only a few minutes use. I would much rather get one that works for something like 5 or 10 seconds with a cool down of say 1 - 3 minutes. It would be cool if it was a "badge" earned by "arresting" a given number of mechanical flying opponents.

Come to think of it, could there be a tangible difference between arresting an opponent and beating them into submission?

On a different note...
I seem to remember getting a jet pack that was good for only a few minutes use. I would much rather get one that works for something like 5 or 10 seconds with a cool down of say 1 - 3 minutes. It would be cool if it was a "badge" earned by "arresting" a given number of mechanical flying opponents.
Come to think of it, could there be a tangible difference between arresting an opponent and beating them into submission?
"THE TITANS ARE COMING! THE TITANS ARE COMING!"

I expect there could be a difference. Though either something you'd have to toggle on and off or just a choice you'd get after certain missions. Otherwise you'd have to like, click every defeated enemy and arrest them... Or something.

Though on that note I did have some ideas on some alternatives to crime fighting in game, but probably best left to another thread.

But to save you the effort, here's the post, as fresh today as the day I wrote it, although it does smell a bit of mothballs and cedar. Go figure.

Huckleberry wrote:

I know the whole discussion of death penalties has been gone over to death on these forums (pun intended), but I would like to add one thing about the "down but not out" mechanic that may have very real implications in this game.
We have three alignment axes:

Law

Honor

Violence

If you defeat enemies and leave them in the "down but not out" condition, you should have the option of

giving them a killing blow

interacting with them to subdue them

ignoring them and moving on with your mission, assuming that the game will make NPCs who go down follow a script appropriate to their lore (do they get back up and fight like berzerkers, do they commit suicide like fanatics, do they run away like sane people, or do they run to get reinforcements?)

Each of these options will have a corresponding affect on your aligment, and maybe even affect your reputation with both the giver of the mission and the enemies themselves.

Edit: and getting to know which enemies will do what actions will be part of the feel of the world and the lore that I think would be nice. maybe some berzerker types would need to be beaten down multiple times before they stop getting up again... maybe the only way to stop fanatics from killing themselves would be to 'subdue' them first, etc. etc.

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I like to take your ideas and supersize them. This isn't criticism, it is flattery. I come with nothing but good will and a spirit of team-building. If you take what I write any other way, that is probably just because I wasn't very clear.

I prefer badging systems that have minimal negative effect on social interactions and participation within the game. Badges that encourage positive, cooperative interactions and participation are also my preference. This might mean a bias against solo play for some, so perhaps not too heavy on play "gated" by group content. I prefer a MMO with exclusive, one-time events as well. The game is more exciting and immersive for me. I'm happy if removing the exclusive association of badges/accolades/schwag with those events from the game would offer more participation from others in one-time events. Perhaps a one-time event could offer earlier (not exclusive) access to a storyline or purchase of unique items, or even said badges? I believe this been proposed before...

ps
Nothing sadder than a burnt out badger though. Best to give them a break from all the pressure. :-)

Huckleberry
The only problem I see with this would be having to select this every single time. If I wanted to arrest all foes who get like that it'd severely impact the flow of the game.

True. Picking up loot has always had the same effect. One of the things that Wildstar got right was their proximity loot system, where you could click one button and vacuum up all loot in your area.

So, let's take that idea and run with it. Let's say that in the beginning you have to actually click each opponent (or ignore as the case may be). But as you generate faction reputation, you get things that can assist you.

So let's say that you want to drive up your lawful alignment. If you start running missions given to you by law enforcement faction(s) then maybe at a certain reputation threshold they give you a "Beacon Transponder" that alerts the nearest law enforcement agency to come to your location and arrest all the enemies you have defeated. So in effect, this beacon transponder would be an AoE subdue ability. The visual representation would be a pair of flashing red and blue lights on every subdued opponent in your area, replacing the circling stars indicator.

Going further, each of the six alignment vectors can be represented by such an AoE effect device. Want violence? Get a device that puts all the defeated opponents down (such as a low voltage, high current AoE impulse to any defeated opponents in the area, causing ventricular defibrillation and death) graphicly represented by the opponents letting out a scream, twitching and then laying still. Effects TBD by AoE kill method.

EDIT: where this could get interesting is when different players are trying for different alignments.

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I like to take your ideas and supersize them. This isn't criticism, it is flattery. I come with nothing but good will and a spirit of team-building. If you take what I write any other way, that is probably just because I wasn't very clear.

Get interesting? Get messy more like. Though it'd probably just influence the party leader and they'd get the say on it if teaming. I mean it's suck to get your character's alignment dictated by committee.

Also as loot systems go, I think it's FF14 where defeats just automatically grant loot to those involved (some MMO I played recently does this), auto-loots are great for a zero hassle approach (especially as heroes raiding the bodies of the fallen isn't super heroic). Downside to this is it's harder to keep track of what you pick up.

In addition to what Tyche said, actions such as defeat X number of Y, street sweep the neighborhood of Z, defeat all enemies on a map, heal for X hit points, and so on, are not badges but part if a Challenge and Achievements system.

These can be earned, in some cases reset and earned again, and can lead to earning greater bonuses to rewards at greater achievement milestones. Sometimes an achievement may unlock a permanent power that grants some bonus related to the activity or eventually unlocking a power.

Crafting comes to mind here where it could be possible to reach an achievement that say, grants you a bonus to crafting a certain type of augment. These are just examples mind you and subject to change and all that.

I would also stress there is a diffetence between what is given to your account, and what your character earns in game. The KS badge is an example here. That would be an account badge. You as a person did something and your account was recognized for it. This shouldn’t be in the game, it had nothing to do with in-game actions related to a character.

Personally, I would prefer account badges be only visible to the account holder. But certain recognitions may be warantd for public displace such as on the forum, but not in the game. On this, I have only my opinion to offer.

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I don't use a nerf bat, I have a magic crowbar!
- Combat Mechanic - Tech Team.

Doctor Tyche wrote:
As we have said since the Kickstarter, the primary unlock of any badge will be costume options.
Would we be able to see what we get for a badge before getting it? I always hate putting in a ton of work for a thing then not liking the thing.

Yes, because they will also be available for cash store purchase as well, with a nice indicator telling you which badge would unlock it through game play, and how to earn that badge.

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Technical Director

Read enough Facebook and you have to make Sanity Checks. I guess FB is the Great Old One of the interent these days... - Beamrider

Project_Hero wrote:
Doctor Tyche wrote:
As we have said since the Kickstarter, the primary unlock of any badge will be costume options.
Would we be able to see what we get for a badge before getting it? I always hate putting in a ton of work for a thing then not liking the thing.
Yes, because they will also be available for cash store purchase as well, with a nice indicator telling you which badge would unlock it through game play, and how to earn that badge.

Picking up loot has always had the same effect. One of the things that Wildstar got right was their proximity loot system, where you could click one button and vacuum up all loot in your area.

Personally, I'd prefer the system from CoH, where no loot 'drops', it just appears in inventory. Loot accumulates, painlessly, because I don't have to stop playing the game, to 'grab the loot'. I can focus on playing and not worry about the 'rewards' until I'm ready to stop.

Some form of 'send all this to the Bank' function is useful. Whether it's through 'port-o-matic' technology, or if I have to stop at a Up-Ex kiosk and mail the stuff in. I've often suggested that heroes could have a Contact who acts as an automatic-crafter. So we could gather up a dozen 'ubiquitous widgets' and send them to the crafter to make the desired stuff.

Look a little closer at what is being asked here.
Some want badge titles. Some want a meager boost to output.
For those that want a title, the background lore behind the badge title is meaningless. The important part is having the string of text next to their name. The badge and how it was earned is meaningless (i.e. a one-off action that is begrudgingly taken to gain something). You aren't weaving your story into the wider story of the zone/event/whatever, you just want the string next to your name. Why not just ask for the capability to just give yourself a title? That way it will fit into your own character's narrative.
As for the boost to effectiveness, why not just make power slotting a more transparent (and hopefully better understood) process? Notoriety for street sweeping against a certain gang would probably garner attention from said gang (or maybe they recoil into the darkness). But what it might also do is gain the attention of contacts that need help from a super that has experience dealing with this scum, allowing you to go deeper down the rabbit hole. Then that could lead to rewards that help your effectiveness or whatever. The situation where all you have to do is kill X mobs to get +1% seems like a flat & uninteresting throw away experience. Another task to ignore or endure before you do something else that is "important".

Radiac wrote:

To respond to @Planet10:
1. Half the fun of badge titles is earning them. If you let people just pick one without having to do anything to unlock it, you're not adding any incentive to play the game at all, you're just handing people something they want because they want it. The point of a game is that you have to play it to get the stuff, not just have it given to you for free. Also you CANNOT let people write their own titles. you have to let the devs write them and the players unlock them. Too many dirty jokes....
2. Are you saying that any kind of passive stat buff type power or long recharge prestige power is bad? Because I would want that stuff, were it in the game, but what you're talking about doesn't sound like it would interest me enough to do content for it. Like, if I'm getting all the badges for defeating Freaks, I'm probably already in contact with like ALL of the Freak contacts already anyway. If you're implying we should make a special Freak contact that you can only unlock by getting the full set of Freak badges, then why do I want to do that contact's missions now, if i'm already "done" with the badges for that faction?
Now, if they drop different loot when I do their missions, or give out rechargable temp powers or something, that's a different story. but that's also a power-up on the level of the jellomen from CoX, which is not something they they around a lot of all over the place. If the deal is "get all the Freakshow badges so you can unlock a special contact who gives you repeatable daily missions and/or some way to earn cool Freakshow-themed temp powers or something" then I think everyone would want to do every one of those badges now. I know I would. That's also just adding in one more layer of content to have to do before you get the desired reward stuff, whatever it is. I'm okay with that. More game to do for rewards means more fun to be had by me when I do it. Just don't make it too grindy.

(1) Half of the "make/choose your own title" statement was to eliminate the slog of potentially doing something that has nothing to do with your character's backstory just to get a title that fits your unique concept. The other half was to provide a more accurate creative outlet to bring your concept to life. Yes, giving the public full autonomous control over their string would be idiotic. Make it a cash shop option that has a measure of oversight to filter things out. Your "space guy" Rocket Man story is an example of this concept. The object was to get the title to fit your concept. You didn't just trot out there every Saturday morning to make your presence known then stumbled upon a title (then presumably proudly displaying said title to reflect your commitment to the continued effort). You can still have titles tied to badges to further the world lore.

Playing the game is the incentive to play the game. A fully realized character concept is a reason to play the game. If doing whatever you do to get a badge that happens to award a title is fun, that is incentive to play the game. If all you essentially care about is a title, completing a badge to get a title is work that you endure to get the prize at the end of the tunnel (i.e. not playing the game for a discrete amount of time so you can get back to playing the game the way you want to).

(2) The passive buff stuff was concerning the OP:

Quote:

What if completing all of the "Aether Pirate related" defeat badges, i.e. getting the badge for 100, then 500, then 1000 generic AP defeats, plus the one for defeating X bosses, etc (all of which would be non-title-bearing in my mind) resulted in a special (title-bearing) accolade-like badge which not only has a title associated with it (like "Aether Cop" or something) but also granted an accolade-like prestige power? And for the power, I'm thinking something faction-specific and very minor. Like a super-long recharge, AP-themed temp power, or a passive power called "Aether Pirate Expert" that grants maybe +1% damage or +1% defense versus the faction in question etc.

(2 continued) I didn't fully expound upon my point (and I initially latched on to the 1% part). I like special/temporary (long recharge or whatever) powers, they are a callback to past adventures and can ground you somewhat in the world. I have built characters around Sands of Mu. Making it something that is minimally better against one faction is completely unnoticeable, especially at the 1% range. Instead I wanted to suggest that the further you progress in sweeping would open up opportunities to do actual missions from contacts that then reward you with something that lets you (possibly) improve your power(s). And at the same time learn about the functional weaknesses of the faction so you can (maybe) hone your powers to become more effective against them. They could also reward themed temporary or long recharge powers to give you a better chance to defeat the faction taking advantage of their weakness (or give you more time to survive an encounter with them). Not all characters will have powersets that can exploit their weaknesses, so you can gain access to temp powers.

If you are defining your experience as being "done" the moment you finish collecting all of the badges associated with a faction, you and I want to play different games. Plus, that assumes that dev tags badges for all pertinent content associated with each faction over the lifetime of the game.

to Planet10:
1) I disagree that doing content mostly because I want the specific rewards from doing it is necessarily "work". The grindier the content ends up being, the less fun it is, but that's true of any content. Also, I personally do not like content that doesn't give me something I want for my toon. I mean, call me old-fashoined, but if I'm going to defeat a dragon, I walk into that lair because I want the treasure, usually. and I enjoy that stuff when it's fun to do. It took time, strategy, and fun, exciting game play to lurk around Warburg at 6am on a Saturday morning to rescue enough scientists to get the Rocketman badge on my all-human Peacebringer toon, and I couldn't even START doing that until I got his respec done up to make him capable of it solo at the level cap for that zone (and no, I did not resort to using the alien forms, TYVM, I stayed on-concept for the toon! :). It was a project, but I LIKED that about it. At the end, I started typing the lyrics to the song "Rocketman" by Elton John in the broadcast channel, I was so happy. It put some skin in the game and made me feel palpably nervous and on the edge of my seat while rescuing scientists, and like I was on top of the world when I finished.

Contrast that against the grindy mission farming that had to be done to get enough Carnie Illusions for the Archmage accolade and I'd rather do the Warburg thing, but that could have been helped by having a Carnie TF or something that people could do to rack up defeats that way, instead of having to use the boring loophole of "do 99% of mission, exit, reset, repeat AGAIN..." for what felt like BILLION iteration cycles. Getting people to agree to, and successfully do, a Carnie Mission farm was like pulling teeth, and even then I generally wanted to stop as soon as I got mine. All that did was frustrate other people who had helped me if they still needed more for theirs. So I think the implementation is the key. If there's some fun content you can do to get the badge, and people are doing it, it's fine, if you have to pull some grindy mission repeat farm nonesense to get it done, and even THAT takes forever, not so much.

2) As long as it unlocks SOMETHING, I see the Accolade-type badge (the badge for completing a certain themed subset of smaller badges) as valuable. What it unlocks is a matter of discussion, but I'm not against making that unlock some kind of prestige power (power balance needed, but doable, I feel), costume pieces from the faction's wardrobe, XP, IGC, random item drops, titles, or virtually any other perk you think might attract people to doing that content.

But as I just pointed out, having enough content to do (team and solo) to get that stuff is important too.

I'm going to paraphrase something in one of the death penalty threads:All players are built differently and each will have his or her own moods and personal trials. So you never know the threshhold of disappointment, frustration, failure or even boredom that will cause someone to log out of the game. Therefore we should be making sure that when these feelings ebb there still remains a goal, something that causes them to want to log back in again.

Game design is all about creating such impetus. I think titles are one very small incentive that players will consider a reason to consume content in the game. And though small, I think they still drive players significantly. MWM would be fools to grant free form titles and/or make them freely available. I think good game design includes as many goals and incentives for as many player types and moods as possible. In my mind, that includes acquiring titles.

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I like to take your ideas and supersize them. This isn't criticism, it is flattery. I come with nothing but good will and a spirit of team-building. If you take what I write any other way, that is probably just because I wasn't very clear.

Radiac:
I have done similar things to create motivation or challenge myself. It is fun to make your own fun.
As seen on both sides, providing more information/context helps frame the argument. I still stand by my statements.

You know, I don't recall if the Devs have even announced that there Will Be Badges in this game...
Be Well!
Fireheart

It has been stated. See: Geocacher KS perk.

Furthermore, we are planning on a variety of different types of badges, at least in Composition. The exact type, nature, rewards, etc. have not been settled. They're not too high up on the priority list. We want to get the game functional first, then get the Geocacher perks honored, and then worry about the rest. Gameplay will be deciding what effects, if any, will be rewarded with any badges, accolades, or other such things.

Okay, but if there was a badge and you were not there to play the game, so you didn't get it, why is that not perfectly fair? If there was a badge and you didn't play that content, so you didn't get that badge, I don't see the problem. If the Kickstarter happened and you were Poor, so you didn't contribute money, then I don't see why your life is over. I'm regretful, but my life goes on.

I do think that most of those brief opportunity and never again badges should be Account based. Actually, I'd say that any badge that is not related to a specific character, like anything 'meta', should be account based. Still, if Real Life gets in your way... well, that's Real Life. If Real Life excludes you from walking the Wall of China, so you don't get to take selfies... um, yeah. If you were not drunk and disorderly, so you missed the 'I got Arrested at Mardi Gras' photo-op, do you Really want that 'badge'?

I can't help feeling that this argument is just much ado about nothing.

In GW2 a lot of the achievements you can get don't actually give you a publicly wearable "title" like the badges in CoX did...

Wearable Badges, as in an arm, chest, back, and/or cape patch/decal that's visible to all near you, instead of the text box over your character's head? Maybe even a special Accolade Sash like the Boy and Girl Scouts use for their achievement badges?

I'm not sure wearable badges would work so well with all the costume possibilities and character concepts out there.

Not that it is a bad idea. I really like the idea. Trying to figure out how to make it work such that any character could wear any badge is the challenge. On the other hand, some rewards in CoX were capes even though not every character design included a cape. So maybe it is enough of a reward that the option is available.

But some other form of aesthetic reward could also work, even if it is not a wearable badge or a costume item. For instance, if you save the local embodiment of Gaia from the Moloch worshipers who wanted to sacrifice her, you get a reward that grows flowers in your footsteps everywhere you go (should you choose to have it active, of course). Or maybe if you get a badge associated with the Orbit Room, you get a little 50's era rocketship that circles around you wherever you go. There could be a mini Vril Rundflugzeug that circles around you for the Vrill-associated "Foo Fighter" badge.

...and so on.

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I like to take your ideas and supersize them. This isn't criticism, it is flattery. I come with nothing but good will and a spirit of team-building. If you take what I write any other way, that is probably just because I wasn't very clear.